Uconn

Griner, Baylor too much for UConn BY ROGER CLEAVELANDRepublican-American

HARTFORD — It was a given going into Monday's marquee matchup between No. 1-ranked Baylor and No. 3 ranked UConn that no championship would be won. At its foundation, the game was most importantly an opportunity for women's basketball to showcase itself to a national TV audience.

It offered the sport's 6-foot-8 phenomena Brittney Griner showing off her wares against the maturing talents of UConn's Stefanie Dolson. The Huskies' Bria Hartley and Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis squaring off against Baylor's enigmatic point guard Odyssey Sims on a stage that could propel them into the national consciousness.

In the end, Baylor's 76-70 victory delivered exactly what was expected of it. In front of 16,294 pink-clad raucous fans — the biggest crowd of the season in women's basketball — the Huskies and Lady Bears infused a little bit of excitement or interest into an otherwise ho-hum season for the sport as a whole.

Behind a 25-point, nine-rebound performance by Griner that gave her exactly 3,000 points for her career, the defending national champion Lady Bears improved to 25-1. After winning all 40 games last season, their only loss this season came against Stanford in a game in which Sims didn't play.

Griner scored 21 points in the second half. Brooklyn Pope added 18 points and nine rebounds for Baylor while Kimetria Hayden scored 11 as the Lady Bears tied the series between the two teams, 2-2.

UConn (24-2) was led by Mosqueda-Lewis with 26 points and 15 rebounds and by Dolson with 11 points and seven rebounds. Hartley had 13 points and five assists while Morgan Tuck had 11 points and five rebounds.

The Huskies committed 18 turnovers and allowed 21 offensive rebounds.

Baylor didn't take its first lead 50 seconds into the second half, 30-29, on back-to-back baskets by Kimetria Hayden and Griner.

UConn regained the lead on its next possession, however, and slowly regained momentum, taking a seven-point lead on a strange four-point play.

Griner had the ball knocked away from her that led to a Hartley breakaway layup. Frustrated about losing the ball, Griner grabbed the arm of Dolson who was ahead of her. Dolson was turned around by the arm pull, lost her balance and fell to the ground. She came up

See UCONN, Page 6C

holding her elbow with tears in her eyes.

After Hartley scored on the layup, the officials stopped the game and reviewed the foul to see if it was flagrant. They ruled it was a flagrant 1 foul, and awarded Dolson two foul shots. She made both to give the Huskies a seven-point lead, 41-34.

The Huskies were also awarded the basketball, but immediately turned it over and Baylor quickly grabbed back momentum of the game. The Lady Bears went on an 8-0 run to regain the lead, 42-41, with Jordan Madden scoring five of the points in the run.

The lead then changed four times over the next four possessions with Baylor emerging with a 47-46 lead with 12:15 to play. It would lose the lead only once more very briefly by one point the rest of the game on a Morgan Tuck putback, 50-49.

A 3-pointer by Sims with 9:47 to play gave Baylor the lead for good, 52-50. Baylor went on to extend its lead by as many as seven points, 65-58 with six minutes to play.

A 17-foot jumper and a 3-pointer by Mosqueda-Lewis pulled the Huskies within two points again, 67-65, at the 3:53 mark, but Griner answered at the other end to give the Lady Bears the cushion they needed to finish the Huskies off.

It was a game UConn let get away after the Huskies had controlled the entire first half.

The Huskies scored the first three baskets of the game and jumped out to a 12-2 lead 4:28 into the game on the strength of seven points from Mosqueda-Lewis. She made three of her first four shots including a 3-pointer.

Mosqueda-Lewis also had five rebounds by the time she picked up her second foul of the game at the 8:29 mark. Auriemma left her in the game, because she was such a big presence for the Huskies.

Mosqueda-Lewis left the game shortly afterward, but stayed out only 1:49 before returning because the Huskies' offense went stagnant without her.

Mosqueda-Lewis played the final 7:49 of the first half with two fouls and went into intermission with 13 points and 10 rebounds.

Her offensive rebound with three seconds to play in the half off a missed jumper by Breanna Stewart led to a pair of free throws as she was fouled with 1.6 seconds to play. She made both to stop an 8-0 run by Baylor and give the Huskies a 29-26 lead at the break.

UConn never trailed in the first half despite the fact that three players – Mosqueda-Lewis, Hartley and Kelly Faris – each had two fouls.

The Huskies led by nine points, 27-18, with 3:23 to play in the half before the Lady Bears went on their 8-0 run to pull within a point.

Foul trouble aside and defensive rebounding aside, things went according to the game plan for the Huskies in the first half as they held Baylor's two star players, Griner and Sims, to a combined 3-for-19 shooting performance from the field and only six points.

Sims shot 1-for-10 from the field, making only one breakaway layup in the first half. Griner shot 2-foor-9, as she constantly drew double teams with Faris helping Dolson by collapsing on Griner each time she got the ball.

The Huskies paid for it by allowing three layups off Griner dump-down assists out of the double-teams, but it was a trade-off they gladly accepted.

Post a reader comment

We encourage your feedback and dialog. Please be civil and respectful.If you're witty, to the point and quotable, your reader comments may also be included on the Around the Towns page of The Sunday Republican. Readers must be registered and logged in to post comments on the site. Registration is free. Click Here to register.
A Subscription is not required to post comments only a Registration.